


Spelling and Punctuation

by sarahjacobs



Category: Newsies (1992), Newsies - All Media Types, Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: Love Letters, M/M, Pining, jack is in l o v e, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-08
Updated: 2017-12-08
Packaged: 2019-02-12 01:30:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12948396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarahjacobs/pseuds/sarahjacobs
Summary: Jack gives David a love letter.





	Spelling and Punctuation

**Author's Note:**

> Sleep? Idk her. Good luck, it’s late and this is unedited.

Jack stares down at the letter sitting in front of him. He pulled at the collar of his shirt before erasing at least three sentences and rewriting them. Katherine sat close to him, watching over his shoulder.

“It’s good, Jack,” She would say occasionally when he laid his pencil down for her to reread. “He’ll love it.”

“He’s the better writer,” Jack says, signing the paper with his name and a small drawing.

“Who is?” David asks, joining the pair at their table.

“No one!” Jack says immediately, he quickly shuts his notebook.

“Okay?” David laughs and digs in his book bag for pencils and his binder.

Jack watches David with a smile as he zips his backpack and shrugs off his coat. David pulls at his sweater and rubs his hands against his khaki pants. Katherine nudges Jack in the side. Jack glares over at her and she points to his notebook, then points over to David. Jack shakes his head no as she shakes her head yes.

“Are you guys okay?” David speaks, looking up at them through his round glasses. He pushes them up his nose and Jack tries hard not to sigh at how cute he is.

“Fine,” Katherine answers for the both of them. David doesn’t ask anymore questions.

David began taking notes as the teacher began talking. Jack opened his notebook and flipped to the letter, strategically hiding it from David. Jack gave up eventually, closing the notebook and lying his head on the desk. He felt David awkwardly pat his back and smiled.

—

“Jack, seriously,” Katherine bugs him, “Just go and give it to him.”

“I can’t do that!” Jack immediately replies. He wrings his hands together, “That would be so embarrassing!”

“What would?”

Jack nearly groans as he turns around.

“We keep ending up in the same situation,” David laughs to himself, “So?”

“It’s nothing,” Jack tells him. “I promise.”

David nods and looks at Katherine, who nods also. She quickly rushes off, leaving the boy’s by themselves.

“You know you can talk to me, Jackie,” David grins, hanging his glasses onto his sweater. He rocks back and forth on his heels.

“I know,” Jack says, playing with the folded letter in his pocket. “I’m bi.”

“Yeah, Jackie, I know that,” David laughs again. “You constantly remind everyone.”

Jack laughs this time, “It’s just, there’s this guy…”

“Oh?” David says, taking a small step backwards.

“Yeah,” Jack replies, “He’s real great, Dave.”

“Really great,” David says.

“Huh?”

“That’s good, Jack! So who is it?” David says excitedly.

Jack stares at him confusion before quickly recovering, “Can’t tell you that.”

“Why not?”

“Classified information,” Jack tells him. David rolls his eyes but doesn’t ask any further questions.

—

“Dave!” Jack calls, running to catch up with the curly haired boy.

David slows down and waits for Jack to catch up. “What?” He asks, looking down at Jack.

Jack nervously unfolds the letter in his pocket. He looks at it before passing it to David, “Read this, please? And just…uh, yeah,” Jack says.

“Sure Jackie,” David grins and Jack quickly rushes the other way.

—

Jack walked to school the next morning, his stomach in knots from nervousness. He looked around the courtyard for Katherine, but couldn’t spot her. She was most likely with Sarah. He looked around once more before deciding to go on ahead to first block. Jack looked around the school nervously, trying to avoid David.

David hadn’t responded to Jack’s texts or calls. Jack had scared him off, that’s what it was. David didn’t feel the same way about Jack. David hated him—

“Jack!” Jack spun around, looking for whoever shouted his name. He froze when seeing David rush towards him. Jack moved out of other people’s way, David quickly followed him.

“Here,” He said, passing Jack his letter back. Jack felt his heart sink, “I’m sorry I didn’t answer your messages, I got caught up in family stuff and homework. I did read the letter like you said…” The bell rang, cutting him off.

David swore under his breath, “I can’t be late for first!” He said, “I’ll talk to you later Jack!” And with that David rushed off.

Jack stared after him before slowly opening the folded letter. Jack looked at all the red marks on his paper in confusion. David had crossed out words, added commas and corrected his spelling. Jack felt tears sting his eyes, but he refused to let them fall.

He slowly made his way to first block. He immediately laid his head down when he got there. Katherine asked him what was wrong but he ignored her.

Jack didn’t even know the bell had rung until Katherine helped him up out his seat.

“Jack?”

“I gave Davey the letter,” Jack says sadly.

“And?”

“And nothing,” Jack tells her, “He gave it back with spelling and punctuation corrections.”

Katherine stared at him with wide eyes, “Well did he know it was for him?”

“Well I would assume he would know that!” Jack yelled.

“I’m sorry, Jack,” Katherine says, taking his hand in hers. “Maybe you should talk to him.”

—

The rest of the day flew by, Jack not paying attention in any classes and trying his best to ignore David. It wasn’t easy, but Jack managed. David attempted to talk to him a few times, but all Jack did was stare straight ahead.

Jack could hear David following after him, but that only made Jack speed up.

“Jack Kelly!” David shouted. Jack paused and David took that opportunity to seize him by the back of the shirt. “Jack!”

“Davey!” Jack mocks.

“What’s wrong?” David asks innocently and Jack rolls his eyes.

“What’s wrong?” Jack repeats, “Well I seem to be in love with you and you’re so oblivious to it! Hell, I gave you the most heartfelt love letter, but you gave it back with spelling and punctuation corrections? You could’ve just told me you didn’t feel the same way!”

David was taken aback by the sharpness in Jack’s voice, he opened his mouth to reply but nothing came out. David stared at him a few more moments, “Jack, I—”

“It’s fine, Dave, let’s just pretend it never happened.”

“Jack! I thought you wrote that letter to the boy you liked! You told me you liked someone so I just assumed—” David explains, “I really like you too, dork.”

Jack grins and pulls David into a tight hug.

“I still can’t believe you gave it back to me with corrections—”

“Hey! I thought you wanted me to revise it before you gave it to him!”


End file.
